


Octopus & Cat

by SlipKnitPass



Category: MacGyver (TV 2016)
Genre: F/M, Found Family, Gen, Healthy Relationships, Light Angst, Mac's many issues, Mild Hurt/Comfort, Mostly Fluff, friendships, like almost imperceptible angst, vague discussions of mental health
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-06-04
Updated: 2020-06-09
Packaged: 2021-03-03 22:53:37
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,590
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24533362
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SlipKnitPass/pseuds/SlipKnitPass
Summary: Holly Hannity is just trying to Make This Relationship Work. Mac is definitely (probably) not deliberately trying to make that difficult.A series of scenes from the life of Mac and Holly as they build a life together, navigating the waters of emotional issues, nosy teammates, missteps, and bad timing.
Relationships: Angus MacGyver (MacGyver TV 2016)/Original Female Character(s)
Comments: 2
Kudos: 9





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Y'all, this is the first work I've ever posted and I'm super nervous, so hopefully it's not terrible!  
> Disclaimer: I'm not a licensed counselor, so feel free to correct me on anything mental health related! I tried not to go beyond what I know in that area.  
> Enjoy, I guess!

“Mmm, babe, you’re a world-class cuddler, but you have _absolutely_ no chill,” Holly tells her boyfriend sleepily from her position (laying halfway under him) on the couch. She catches his slowly bouncing foot between her shins as she wiggles her arm out from under him and puts her hand over his on her hip, where he’d been repeatedly tapping out a rhythm. She was pretty sure it was something in Morse code, the absolute nerd.

She tilts her head up to look at him and feels a wave of affection crash over her at the faint flush along his cheekbones. Maybe the exhaustion of a long week is getting to her because Holly’s eyes water a little and she can’t help but ask herself how she got so lucky. She leans up a little and plants a kiss on his lips before releasing him and tucking herself back under him. Almost immediately, Mac goes back to tapping.

“She’s got you pegged, dude,” Bozer agrees from the recliner. “You may be cool under pressure, but I don’t think I’ve seen you sit still for more than five minutes if you aren’t on an op.”

“Thank you, Bozer,” comes Holly’s muffled reply. Her face is currently half-smooshed into Mac’s shoulder. She feels Mac’s arm moving and assumes he’s thrown something at Bozer for lack of any sort of real defense against the charge. Holly finds it interesting that while she and Bozer are right and Mac is never quite _still,_ none of his motions are frantic or hurried. When he fidgets (which is always) it’s things like the tapping on her hip or his habit of bending paperclips: controlled, if somewhat absent-minded.

_But really_ , Holly thinks, she’s lucky to be at this point with Mac. She can still remember the beginning of their relationship, when he was so cautious and guarded that she counted it as a win when he was willing to hold her hand in front of Bozer, let alone in public. She can remember “spirited discussions” as he called them (arguments, really) where she accused him of being emotionally distant and he called her clingy and a tease. She can remember thinking that she was going to have to break up with her soulmate because she couldn’t be with someone who always had one foot out the door to protect himself.

_And yet, here we are_. Holly sighs contentedly, warm and cozy and so wrapped up in Mac that it’s hard to tell where one of them ends and the other begins. It hasn’t been an easy journey; there were days when she thought they wouldn’t make it (there are maybe still days when she thinks they won’t make it–see also: the Yarn Incident). But she knows that Mac is committed and if it’s true that Mac has No Chill, it’s also true that once he sets his mind to something, no one can dissuade him.

Holly drifts off, secure in the knowledge that when she wakes up, Mac will still be there, draped on top of her like the giant house cat he pretends not to be. She knows that, if he's awake, he’ll probably be tapping out that same rhythm on her hip or her arm or whatever body part is closest to his own hand. Later, she’ll bug him to tell her what he keeps tapping but for now, she is content.

\---------

“So, you gonna tell Holly anytime soon?” comes Bozer’s quiet question, once he’s sure Holly is asleep.

“Tell her what, Bozer?” Mac replies, and Bozer can practically hear his eyeroll.

“That you love her. _You_ were the one who taught me Morse code, so really you played yourself, man. You’ve been tapping out “love you” for the past two weeks.”

“That’s not…I can’t just…look it’s complicated okay,” Mac whispers furiously, his face now fully red, embarrassed to have been found out so easily.

“It isn’t that complicated, Mac. You love the girl, you tell her. I can pretty much guarantee you she feels the same. Only someone who loves you would stay after some of the knock-down drag-outs you two had at the beginning.”

Mac shifts a little, careful not to disturb Holly, so that he’s no longer able to see Bozer in the recliner. It’s a deflecting maneuver, he knows, but he can’t help it. He and Bozer are brothers in all the ways that matter, but Mac _hates_ feeling exposed and vulnerable. Bozer’s words hit too close to home, sound too much like the question Mac asks himself sometimes: what if she leaves?

“Really, looking away to avoid the argument? That’s mature, Mac,” Bozer tells him in a wry voice that lacks any real censure. He’s known Mac for over 20 years, after all.

Mac takes a deep breath and stops to think before responding. While Holly tries not to bring her day job home and psychoanalyze him, she has cautiously given him some things to do when he starts to feel this way, defensive and exposed. He knows it’s not Bozer’s fault that he’d hit on Mac’s biggest fear, so instead of focusing on the fear of Holly leaving, he thinks about that morning, when he’d woken up to find her in the kitchen. She’d come over early just to make him breakfast and spend a few minutes with him. Mac recalls all the times that she’s gone out onto the deck during an argument, only to come back in when they're both ready to finish talking about the issue. She always comes back, every time, no matter how bad it gets.

“Boze, I’m sorry. Maybe you’re right and it’s not complicated, but I’m still…there are still things I’m working out in my head,” Mac sighs. “And I wish I could turn and look at you again to apologize, but I think Holly’s got me in some kind of wrestling hold? I’m not sure how she’s managed this. Frankly, it’d be a great hand to hand combat move if she could do this while conscious,” Mac finishes drily.

“Apology accepted. Good night. Enjoy your disgustingly cute cuddling with your weird octopus girlfriend,” Bozer whispers cheerfully, getting up to go to bed.

Mac would like to protest Bozer’s comparison, but Holly is rather like an octopus when she sleeps (and when she’s awake if he’s being honest), wrapping as much of herself around him as possible. He can’t find it in himself to complain, though, even jokingly. He loves feeling her this close. It reassures him and just…makes him feel loved in a way physical affection hadn't before. He presses in tighter against Holly, resting his head next to her and settling in for what he knows will be a restful sleep. It always is when he has Holly with him.


	2. "I love you" but make it MacGyver style

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Mac works up the courage (sort of) to tell Holly how he feels. Holly is not thrilled by his delivery, but she'll take what she can get.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So, I didn't really establish any timeline or anything in the first chapter (my bad) but this takes place sometime in the season 1 - 2 range and they've been dating like, a yearish? It's not super important, but it's worth mentioning.

“Angus!”

Mac’s head jerks up when he hears Holly calling him by his first name. She must have been trying to get his attention for a while, because she usually only uses his first name as a last resort. He’d been woolgathering, as his grandpa used to say.

“Yes, Handy?” he replies, syrupy sweet. Two can play at the unfortunate name game, although Handy is a nickname Holly has shaken off, rather than a given name. He gets a little glare in return before she turns back to the lunch dishes she’s washing at the sink.

She’d driven over to Mac’s place when he told her he unexpectedly had a break in the day. Hollly and Mac don’t usually get to have lunch together, but he’s home for an hour or two to pack a few things and eat with her before leaving. There is apparently a “sudden opportunity” for Mac, Bozer, and Riley to “attend a conference” through the “think tank” he works for (and they’re definitely going to have to talk about that whopper of a lie eventually).

“I was just saying that I invited your dad and your sister to come over for dinner when you guys get back into town.”

“You invited my who now?” Mac asks, both startled and confused. “Your dad and your sister,” Holly repeats slowly, as if that’ll make the words make any more sense. “Jack and Riley? Just dropped you off here? We all had a cup of coffee together; I’m almost positive you were here for that entire 10 minutes.”

Mac sputters incredulously for a moment, a vaguely constipated look on his face. “They’re not- Jack’s not my… and Riley isn’t–”

Holly is unable contain herself any longer as Mac scrambles to clarify his relationships and her laughter cuts him off.

“Oh man, the look on your face! Babe, I know they’re not actually related to you,” she says once she’s collected herself a little. “I’ve met them plenty of times, enough to know that they work with you. Although you have to admit, y’all are definitely more like a family than coworkers.”

Mac smirks at her a little when he registers her use of ‘y’all.’ Holly doesn’t really have a southern accent, but having grown up in the panhandle of Florida, she had picked up some southern vocabulary that she can’t fully shake, and Mac loves to tease her about it. She gives him a dirty look in return, knowing exactly what he’s smirking about.

“They’re really not...” Mac trails off and looks at Holly, who’s waiting expectantly for the rest of his sentence. “Yeah, I guess you’re right. They are my family; the family I got to choose. Or maybe the family that chose me.” Mac glances down at his hands as he says the words and Holly sees his shoulders get that slight, stiff arch to them, like a cat arching its back defensively. Like he’s waiting for someone to pop out and tell him he’s wrong. _A diffusion of tension, then_ , Holly thinks.

She places a hand to her chest and staggers back across the kitchen dramatically, narrowly avoiding a chair.

“Is that…Is that a real, unsolicited emotion from Angus MacGyver? And introspection? I don’t believe it. This is clearly the work of body snatchers. Or coercion? Is somebody forcing you to have feelings, Mac?” Holly’s tactics work; Mac’s shoulders relax and a small smile spreads across his face. Holly is genuinely surprised when he grabs her hand and pulls her back across the kitchen to sit on his lap. While Mac is now very physically affectionate with her, this kind of boldness is still unusual for him. He looks her right in the eye for his next words.

“Well, I don’t normally have them,” he starts sarcastically, before switching to a gentler tone, “but a very wise person in my life has suggested that instead of burying everything I feel, I should maybe acknowledge it, like how much Jack and Riley mean to me.”

Holly tears up and she catches her breath in surprise. Mac generally does everything in his power to make it seem like he doesn’t need connections to other people. For him to allow himself to be vulnerable and admit how much Riley and Jack mean to him…it is a sign of so much healthy progress for him. She gives Mac a watery smile then buries her face in his shoulder. They sit there like that for a few minutes, Holly contemplating how much she loves Mac (and how she should really tell him that soon) and Mac tapping out that same rhythm on her back that he's been tapping since movie night two weeks ago.

Mac’s phone chirps, alerting him to Jack and Riley’s arrival; they’re here to pick him up and take him back to the Phoenix Foundation. Holly reluctantly releases Mac and stands up, following him to the door. He pulls her out onto the front porch with him, kissing her deeply for a moment, ignoring Jack’s wolf whistle from the car. He pulls back and looks her in the eye intently again.

“I’ll see you when we get back. I love you,” he tells her firmly before bolting off down the drive.

“Did you just–? **Angus MacGyver come back here! You don’t say that and leave for a probably fake conference trip!** ” she hollers at him, too stunned to pretend to believe his cover like she normally does. “ **And I love you, too!** ” It’s not quite how she pictured them saying those words to each other for the first time, but she can see Mac laughing and blowing her a kiss from the backseat of Jack’s car as they pull away and she thinks that it’s perfectly…them. She stands on the porch for a minute after Jack’s car has disappeared from view, a silly smile on her face and one hand pressed to her lips.

\---------

“Now, Mac, I know I taught you better than to tell a woman you love her right before you run away from her!” Jack’s voice from the front seat is indignant.

“Yeah, Mac, what is this? Elementary school? Gonna pull her ponytail, too?” Riley chimes in with a smug grin.

Mac flushes bright red, but doesn’t respond to them, looking out the window instead. He can’t stop himself from smiling hugely, though, when he thinks about Holly yelling in a disgruntled tone that she loved him, too.

“I see that fool grin on your face,” Jack says with an answering smile. “But now, it might be time to talk to Matty about letting Holly in on the job. It ain’t right to lie like that to your future wife.”

Mac just sits in the back seat, gaze now focused on Jack, mouth opening and closing, his normally whirring brain screeching to a halt. What was with people pushing him out of his emotional comfort zone today?

“Mac, I think we all know where your relationship is going. Holly is…amazing for you. It’s just a matter of when you'll take the next step at this point,” Riley points out, twisting in the front seat to look at him.

“Matter of – is there an office pool for when I’ll – if I’ll propose?” Mac asks incredulously.

The hemming and hawing from the front seat are answer enough.

“When did you people even start this?”

“It may have started this past Christmas after you two exchanged gifts,” Jack says reluctantly.

“I can’t believe you, both of you!”

“Well, you’re going to have to add Matty and Bozer to the list of people you can’t believe,” Riley informs him, throwing their other coworkers under the bus immediately.

“Look, I just told her I love her for the first time-”

“The first time?” Riley says in a choked voice. “You told her you love her for the FIRST TIME and then RAN AWAY?!” By the end of the sentence, she’s yelling.

“Well, I mean, I… It seemed like a good idea in the moment? If she didn’t say it back, then I could deal with that away from her. And if she did say it back, it was something to look forward to when I got home.”

“You’ve had some crazy ass plans in the past, buddy, but this was probably your worst one,” Jack tells him gently.

“Well, it’s done and she said it back,” Mac points out, before turning back to look out the window. Later, as they're pulling up to the Phoenix Foundation, his phone buzzes and he takes it out, smiling softly when he sees the notification from Anchor: a new episode of his favorite podcast. Maybe Holly didn’t mind their unconventional “I love yous” after all.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The podcast will become relevant, don't worry.


End file.
